The journey of a Muslim mommy to two little ones.

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Our Week in Pictures

I got the idea of a “Week in Pictures” from other blogs I enjoy and thought I would give it a try. The weekly post will showcase activities covered throughout the week with short descriptions. Since the weekdays here in the UAE are technically Sunday through Thursday and weekends Friday and Saturday, our posts will either be published by Saturday night or Sunday morning. Let’s hope I pull through.

Cotton Ball Clouds

For our weather unit, I attempted to teach Little Duck sunny at first. I soon realized it would be difficult for her to understand sunny if I never pointed out and identified the sun for her – how silly of me! And so, a few weeks ago we learned the word for sun through a fun craft, observation, and pictures. Masha’Allah, she picked it up right away.

This week we are learning the word for cloud (ghaymah/غيمة). I was lucky to find this book in my husband’s family’s library while they were moving last year that tells the story of an unappreciated cloud. Little Duck loves the book and with a couple of readings she picked up the word for cloud right away. Early on during the week, we also made fluffy clouds by sticking cotton balls onto cut out cloud shapes. It was a simple craft idea Icame up with by searching “cloud toddler projects” on Pinterest.We hung a couple up next to her sun craft and she loves to point them out daily. I am learning that even though the crafts may be simple, she is proud of them and loves to go back and look at what she made – with a lot of assistance from me of course.

Spiced Apple

Although it’s not officially autumn yet, it is apple picking season. I wish we were back in the states so I could take Little Duck to the farm but that will have to wait. For now, I found a craft I fell in love with this week that made the house smell amazing too! We made a scented and textured apple by mixing cinnamon into the red paint. After the project dried, she enjoyed the smell and the rough texture the cinnamon created. It was a great sensorial activity. The details for the project can be found here.

Letter of the Week – Alif

I was going to hold off on introducing letters to Little Duck, but she’s been showing a lot of interest lately. She loves to sing the ABC’s and her Alef Ba Ta’s. I wanted to purchase Arabic Sandpaper Letters from the states and have family bring it over, but I didn’t get to order them in time. I am considering making my own, but for now I decided to go about it in other ways to keep her enthusiastic.

At first, I cut out the letter on card stock, taped it over another paper, and had her paint the area that had been cut out, but she had another idea. She brought over a Q-tip from one of her other activities and wanted to use that. So I gave her the cut out letter, and she used the Q-tip to paint it. The cut out letter came out nicer than the original project. I used a tabletop pocket chart to display the letters we made and a flashcard. We will work on learning the sounds Alef makes this coming week.

Splish Splash

The unfortunate thing about the area we live in is the lack of indoor play areas for Little Duck to enjoy during the summer heat. There are plenty further away, but with a newborn it’s been tough to make those trips. Luckily, we do have an indoor children’s pool in our building and a fountain area right across the street she can run through. Both provide Little Duck with some physical activity. She loves the water and we literally need to drag her out. Pool time is usually reserved for Baba. He’s been doing great building her confidence in the water and she’s already learned how to float, Masha’Allah!